"This is a nice step-by-step review of photosynthesis at the fifth grade level: Science up Close. For fun, follow that up with a much less serious take on photosynthesis from They Might Be Giants" Casey Hodel, 5th grade, Sun Valley
4 Comments
5th graders at Dixie working on angles. Check out Liz Naughton's (Dixie School) comment below.
"This (is a) great book to read to your class when you start animal adaptations/habitats. It's a cute book about Walking Sticks, but also includes incredible information about them. Also, if you are using the Lucy Calkins units of study, this is a great book to show when teaching your informational unit. Fabulous Frogs is another book I found, set up in a similar way as the Walking Stick book and very informative!" Lindsay Hess Wade Thomas
Good Trick, Walking Stick, by Sheri Mabry Bestor Fabulous Frogs, by Martin Jenkins Mitosis in action in 7th grade at Miller Creek! Thanks Janice Woods and Sue Holland! 5th grade at Dixie had the students become birds and did an activity to help them see how different beaks pick up different food. The students collected the data and started to create bar graphs to compare the different beaks with the types of food they are made to eat. 3rd grade from Glenwood did the same beak lesson.
Coleman tests their first iterations of their nests. Bird nest videos from Michelle Giraud, 3rd grade, Sun Valley: "Below you will find 2 videos that support the bird nest lesson. I have shown these and additional ones to my class and they love them. At first, I struggled with when to show it. I decided to show it a few days before they had the chance to actually create their own. Seeing the videos made the idea of creating a nest more realistic and I think they had a better vision than if not seeing it." I attended a NGSS workshop that used the bird beak as a lesson that could encompass many of the concepts in the new standards. I have linked the lesson they used (Lawrence Hall of Science) and took some pictures. They used a variety of "beaks" and a wide variety of "food." They also had an interesting way to graph it at the end. Check out the pictures!
Thank you Cindy Leroux from Sun Valley for sharing these resources: "During our Plant and Animal Adaptation the gestation period of the coyote was discussed. This lead to student questions about other animals. This presents relevant information on 14 animals that can be shown/discussed in sections." Organisms: These were used, some in part as they are long, in an introduction to the Plant and Animal unit. It can begin the discussion as to what an organism is. If students do not have access to microscopes, they might be enlightened. Those with microscopes available might become excited to see what they might see in local pond water. VIDEOS: From Lindsay Hess, 3rd grade Wade Thomas: "Last year we used the SF Zoo Mobile for as part of our animal adaptations unit. The kids really enjoyed it." White Hill 7th graders learn about how structure and function are related while building a "circulatory system." Thanks Kaki!
Here is a great website shared by Natalie Corsini with great picture archives for animal adaptations. Thank you Carolyn Robello for this great video about the life cycle of the frog that she used in her plant and animal adaptation/ecosystem unit: " We studied the Life Cycle of a coyote, a redwood tree, and I showed this video as an example of a frog's life cycle. We also have trout in the classroom so we can see first hand a life cycle to a certain point."
Miller Creek's 7th grade science teachers proposed a challenge to their students: Build a helmet that will protect someone's head from injury. They built small prototypes that would cover an egg and then tested them. Some of the rules: They had to be able to be take off the helmet (Does anyone wear a helmet to bed?), it could encompass the egg (No one has a floating head!), and withstand a face first fall from a specified distance. Here are some pictures of what happened. Thanks Sue Holland, Janice Woods and Erik Lunde! 2nd year of the helmet project. Survivors! Referenced in the new NGSS draft frameworks. Based on the previous science standards but does have correlation charts for the new standards.
|
Archive
February 2017
|
Home
Contact |
iTEAMS is a professional development research project designed to provide teachers with support to deepen their content knowledge and pedagogy to promote STEM education aligned to the Common Core State Standards in Mathematics (CCSS) and Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS).
|